victoria coren mitchell

“There’ll be more high wire mind games next time in our last quarter final. Join us then, goodbye.”

“Hello again. We’re at the quarter final stage here on Only Connect which means our teams have already demonstrated their ability to unearth connections when none seems to exist. But the heats were easy. These are the far more treacherous quarter finals where it’s my job to lure the tugboat of confidence onto the jagged rocks of despair. My specialty. Eager to sail to their doom we’ve got two returning teams.”

“And so another tussle is resolved, the world turns and all things connected slink back into the shadows hoping to escape detection until next time. Goodbye.”

“Hello again and welcome to Only Connect. The quiz which is all about making connections between apparently random clues. This is a quarter final which means that the two teams who survived the horrors of round one have actually come back for more voluntarily. The questions are tougher, the rules are stricter and I’m nastier. I can’t wait.”

“I hope you’ll join us next time for more contestants to be tortured on the rack of quarter final action. Goodbye.”

“Hello and welcome to Only Connect. The quiz that tests not just knowledge but, more importantly, lateral thinking. That ability to switch lanes suddenly in the middle of a mental journey without ploughing into a milk float and scattering yoghurt all over the tarmac of logic.”

“We’ll be back next time with two more teams anxious to engage in a spirited search for missing links and unexpected convergences. Until then, goodbye.”

“Welcome to Only Connect and what is Only Connect?  Well it’s a quiz. But really it’s more of a puzzle. It’s an enigma wrapped in a riddle wrapped in a puzzle wrapped in a quiz and it’s all about making connections. Links and connections between disparate elements and clues that might appear not to be connected at all.”

“We hope you’ll join us next time when two more teams line up to settle their differences in dubious battle. Not on the plains of heaven but upon the undulating field of warfare that is Only Connect. ‘Til then, goodbye.”

“Welcome to Only Connect. A quiz show where innovative lateral thinking will win the day. The object of the game is to deduce the hidden connections between a confusing array of elements, from Ancient Rome to Modern Britain with a few detours in between.”

“And join us next time when two more teams from across the cultural divide will do battle to resolve our tricky tessellations of the torturously trivial and profoundly prescient. Whatever that means. Goodbye.”

“Welcome to Only Connect. The quiz where general knowledge will only take you so far. You’ll also need a measure of patience and a generous dollop of lateral thinking. This is a mental journey off the beaten track and well outside the box.“

“We hope that you will join us next time, when two more teams will seek to bring some kind of order and symmetry to collections of clues that appear to have minds of their own. Until then, goodbye.”

“Hello and welcome to Only Connect. The quiz where general knowledge meets lateral thinking, they get to like each other and live happily ever after. Until general knowledge has an affair, which of course lateral thinking can easily work out and it all ends in bitter divorce.”

“Please join us again next time, when two more teams enter the tunnel of hope and grope for the light at the end of it. Until then, goodbye.”

“Welcome to Only Connect. A quiz that offers its contestants something far greater than the chance merely to win, it’s the chance to show off. Our teams are expected to spot the connections hidden in a duplicitous fog of disguised clues. Imagine the triumph when they succeed and the shame when they don’t. That is the knife edge they walk.”

“Please join us next time, when once again we’ll be trying to demonstrate that even when the world seems random and purposeless there are underlying synergies, it’s just a matter of tuning into them. Goodbye”